You Can’t Protect What You Don’t Understand: Examining Legal’s Dark Data Problem

Unstructured data is the legal industry’s silent crisis—growing unchecked, exposing firms to risk, and straining compliance efforts.

In this fireside chat at Legal Tech Fest, ActiveNav CEO, Peter Baumann, and National Australia Bank’s Executive, Digital & Tech, Legal & Operations, Matt Zaba will explore the hidden dangers of unstructured client matter data and the increasing expectations from corporate clients.

Learn why compliance on paper isn’t enough, how firms can close governance gaps, and what steps legal teams must take today to future-proof their data strategies in an AI-driven world.

Key Learnings

1. The Hidden Data Crisis – Most law firms are sitting on vast, unstructured, and unmanaged data, leading to compliance failures, security risks, and inefficiencies.
2. Beyond Compliance: Real Governance – Having policies isn’t enough. Firms need proactive data strategies to secure client data, prevent breaches, and meet rising client expectations.
3. The Future of Legal Data – AI and automation will reshape legal data governance, but only firms with structured, well-managed data will be able to take advantage.

About Peter

Peter Baumann is the CEO and founder of ActiveNav, a global leader in Governance Risk, Compliance and Privacy solutions for unstructured data. Under his leadership, ActiveNav has helped organizations worldwide discover, inventory, and classify their data, reducing costs, mitigating risk, and unlocking value.

Peter’s career began in electronic publishing, working with Bureau van Dijk and then Standard & Poor’s Global Markets. During the dot-com era, he joined an early-stage internet business, sparking his entrepreneurial drive. He went on to co-found multiple startups, notably including Hanzo, a leader in enterprise information archiving for eDiscovery.

In 2008, Peter co-founded ActiveNav, leveraging a prior venture and technology spun out from Southampton University. With a vision of unstructured data as a strategic asset, Peter believes businesses and public sector organizations can harness information to enhance services and drive operational efficiency.

During recent years and seeing a growing demand for rapid post-breach discovery, ActiveNav built a specialized team leveraging its established platform to support Digital Forensics & Incident Response (DFIR). This capability has quickly became a market leader in the U.S., leading to its 2024 spin-off of Actfore, a dedicated business focused exclusively on breach-related discovery.

With 35+ years of international business experience, he has worked across high-growth finance, technology, and engineering sectors and has lived and worked in the U.S., France, Belgium, and Libya.

Peter holds a Higher National Diploma in Business, Finance, and International Marketing from Bristol Business School. His contributions have earned him prestigious accolades, including the UK’s ITC Enterprise Recovery Entrepreneur Award and the Enterprise Developing Entrepreneur Award.